Choosing and setting up
How to Choose a Metal Detector: Ground First, Machine Second
Quick answer
Choose by the ground you actually hunt rather than by price. Wet salt beaches and mineralised soil need simultaneous multi-frequency, trashy old parks need fast recovery speed and a small coil, and water work needs a machine rated for submersion. Everything else, including tone counts and screen size, is preference.
There are perhaps six decisions in a detector purchase that change what you find, and about thirty that change how the machine feels. Most buying advice spends its time on the thirty. This page spends it on the six, in the order that a machine actually gets limited: ground conditions first, then trash, then water, then weight, then the coil, then the screen and the tones.
The sceptical version of the advice is simple. A detector is a compromise built around one set of assumptions about soil. Buy the machine whose assumptions match your ground, and you will out-find somebody carrying twice the money on the wrong compromise. If you are still at the very start, the beginner guide covers the first season in order, and the beginner kit lists what goes in the bag alongside the machine.
Top pick
Minelab Equinox 700
Simultaneous multi-frequency, waterproof and light enough for a full day, which is the combination that stops the ground being the limiting factor on almost every site type.
Price was accurate when this page was compiled and changes often.
On this page
What actually limits a detector on your ground?
Mineralisation. Iron oxides and salts in the soil produce their own response under the coil, and the machine has to subtract that response before it can hear a coin. The more aggressive the ground, the more of the machine capability is spent on cancelling it, which is why a detector that reaches a target at ten inches in mild park loam might reach the same target at five or six inches in red mineralised clay. That is not a fault. It is the physics, and no amount of money removes it, though better machines lose less to it.
The second limit is trash. On a site with a nail every square foot, the question is not how deep the machine reaches but whether it can separate a good target sitting beside iron. That is a matter of recovery speed and coil size rather than raw depth, and a smaller coil on a modest machine will beat a large coil on an expensive one. The coil size chart sets out that trade in detail, and the coil size selector on this site turns your own site description into a diameter.
Which features matter for which ground?
Read this table by finding your ground in the left column and buying against that row alone. The most common expensive mistake in this hobby is buying the features that suit somebody else site.
Simultaneous multi-frequency is the one feature that genuinely changes results on wet salt sand and mineralised soil, while on dry inland parks a single-frequency machine at a third of the price gives up very little.
| Your ground | What limits you there | Insist on | Can safely skip |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dry inland parks and sports fields | Trash and masking, not depth | Fast recovery speed, a small coil option, good iron audio | Waterproofing beyond the coil, salt modes |
| Old house lots and yards | Dense iron and building debris | A 6 inch class coil, notch control, a pinpointer | Large coils entirely |
| Mineralised red or clay soil | Ground signal eating depth | Manual and tracking ground balance, multi-frequency | High-frequency gold machines unless you hunt nuggets |
| Wet salt sand and surf line | Salt response swamping the machine | Simultaneous multi-frequency and a beach mode, full waterproofing | Single-frequency machines at any price |
| Fresh water and shallow wading | Housing ingress, not soil | A submersion rating you can read in the manual, a waterproof coil cable | Wireless audio, which does not work submerged |
| Ploughed fields and pasture | Ground coverage per hour | A larger coil, light weight, long battery life | Tiny coils, which will cost you the season |
| Gold bearing ground | Tiny target sensitivity in hot rocks | A dedicated high-frequency prospecting machine | Coin and relic tone systems, which get in the way |
Every row here describes a tendency and not a guarantee. Verify the waterproof rating and the frequency behaviour of any specific machine in its own manual before buying, because model names carry over between generations that behave differently.
How much should you actually spend?
The honest bands are these. Under about 150 dollars you are buying a toy that will teach a child that detecting is boring, with the partial exception of machines bought knowingly for that purpose, which is covered in the separate guide to detecting with kids. Between roughly 200 and 400 dollars you get a genuinely capable single or selectable frequency machine, and the Fisher F22 at $229.00 or the Minelab X-Terra Pro at $282.14 are the shape of that band. Around 400 dollars multi-frequency arrives properly, and from there to about 1,000 dollars you are buying refinement, waterproofing and speed rather than a different class of find.
Above that, the Minelab Manticore at $1,499.00 and the XP Deus II at $1,299.00 buy target information in difficult ground and very little on an easy site. The way to think about it is that the second coil, the pinpointer and the digger change your results more per dollar than the step from a good machine to a great one. The value roundup works through where each band stops paying.
Does weight matter as much as people say?
More, and it is the specification most often ignored at the point of purchase. A detector is held at arm length and swung for four to six hours, and the felt weight is not the number on the box but the balance point relative to your elbow. Two machines of identical mass can feel a pound apart depending on where the battery and the control box sit. The weight comparison table on this site lists published weights across the common models so you can at least start from the real numbers.
If a heavier machine is the right machine for your ground, the answer is support rather than compromise. A LimbSaver Comfort-Tech Metal Detector Sling at $20.23 distributes weight across the upper body, and a full Detecting Harness and Swing Support does the same job with eight adjustment points and a bungee that takes the swing weight off the forearm entirely. That is a cheaper solution than buying the lighter machine that cannot handle your soil.
What should you ignore while choosing?
Ignore the maximum depth claim, which is measured on a large target in ideal conditions and does not describe a dime in your clay. Ignore the number of tones, because you will settle on a profile within a season and most people end up running fewer tones than the machine offers. Ignore the screen unless you have eyesight reasons to care. Ignore any comparison of target ID numbers between brands, because the scales are not the same instrument: the target ID chart explains why a 62 on one machine is not a 62 on another.
Ignore, too, the idea that the machine is what stands between you and good finds. Access is the bottleneck in this hobby, which is why getting permission and researching sites are worth more reading time than any specification sheet.
How do you check a machine before committing?
- Write down your ground. One line describing soil colour and type, how much iron trash you expect, and whether salt water is involved. Buy against that line and nothing else.
- Read the actual manual first. Manufacturers publish manuals free. The waterproof rating, the frequency behaviour and the ground balance options are all in there, and they settle most arguments before you spend anything.
- Check the coil range. A machine with only one coil available is a machine that cannot adapt to a trashy site. Confirm that a small coil exists for the model and what it costs.
- Check what the battery is. Sealed internal cells cannot be swapped in the field, so the runtime is the runtime. The battery runtime calculator on this site turns the published figure into hunts per charge.
- Hold one if you possibly can. A club meeting or a dealer counter tells you in two minutes what a specification sheet cannot about balance and grip.
- Bury known targets once it arrives. A test garden is how you learn what your own machine says about your own soil, and it is the single most useful afternoon a new owner can spend.
Sources
- Manufacturer product listings and published specifications for the machines named
- Minelab, Garrett, Nokta, Fisher and XP instruction manuals
- Published coil specifications from Minelab, Garrett and Nokta
Frequently asked questions
Is a more expensive detector actually deeper?
Usually a little, and rarely by as much as the price gap suggests. Above roughly 400 dollars most of the money buys ground handling, recovery speed, waterproofing and target information rather than raw depth. On mineralised soil the better machine keeps more of its depth, which looks like extra depth but is really less loss. On mild park soil the difference narrows to very little.
Do I need simultaneous multi-frequency?
On wet salt sand or in strongly mineralised soil, yes, it is the feature that changes results rather than feel. On dry inland parks and pasture a good single-frequency machine gives up very little and costs a great deal less. Decide by where you will spend most of your hours, not by the site you might visit once a year.
Should my first detector be a cheap one?
Cheap enough to be a real machine, not cheap enough to be a toy. Below about 150 dollars the machines lack usable discrimination and stable ground handling, which teaches beginners the wrong lessons about what a good signal sounds like. A capable entry machine at roughly 250 dollars holds its value and stays useful as a backup when you upgrade.
How important is the coil that comes with it?
The stock coil is a compromise sized for general use, usually around 10 or 11 inches. It is the right starting point, but the first accessory that changes what a machine can do is a smaller coil for trashy ground. Run the stock coil for a season, decide what it is failing at, and then buy the coil that fixes that specific failure.
Can one detector cover beach, park and field?
A waterproof multi-frequency machine comes close, which is why that category sells so well. It will not match a dedicated prospecting machine on tiny gold, and a very large coil for open fields is a separate purchase. For most people one capable machine plus a second coil covers everything they will realistically hunt for several seasons.
Researched, not professional advice. This page is compiled from published specifications, manuals and owner-review consensus, not hands-on testing. Target ID numbers, depth figures and settings vary with soil chemistry, moisture, target size, depth, orientation and firmware version, so treat every figure here as a starting point and verify it against your own machine's manual and your own ground. As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.